Jose Gonzalez - youlikewelike

José González is engaged. But not in the biblical sense, (well, not yet anyway). It’s just that this interview should have started 15 minutes ago and for the fifth time his line is still busy. In fact, as we discuss together later, González is not anything in the biblical sense, relying as he does on rational scientific thought, the knowledge of the human condition and the odd word from evolutionary biologist and hardline atheist, Richard Dawkins, for his musical inspiration, rather than name-checking God in his liner notes and bigging-up spirituality in acceptance speeches.

Once the telephone line is clear and he apologetically answers, his voice is as dulcet as it is on record – complete with distinct Scandinavian lilt. It transpires that he was chatting to an old friend and simply hadn’t realised the time. His plans consist of spending time doing interviews, playing music with both his friends’ and girlfriend’s bands and hopefully just ‘hanging out’. When asked what else he likes to do other than music, the conversation halts, replaced by a long and difficult pause, gently punctuated with the occasional ‘umm’ and ‘ahh’.

“I used to have music as my hobby and now I don’t think I have any,” he finally offers. “Apart from listening to music, reading magazines and eating food – but I wouldn’t call them hobbies,” he says, then laughs, almost as if the latter is only indulged in if his schedule allows. In the desperate hope that there may actually be some eventual depth to this interview, the question is encouraged further. “I like sleeping too,” he says.

The deadpan humour, as well as an excellent icebreaker, is also a serious indication of the fact that time is now a rare commodity to González, as any non-musical, extra-curricular activity must revolve around his constant touring.

“Now with [the album] In Our Nature I’m travelling quite a lot so I try to use free time to go on blogs, read stuff on the Internet and download podcasts. I have also started to read books, something that I haven’t done while touring before.

“I like one by Steven Pinker, The Blank State [an impressive tome on the denial of human nature]. I mentioned Richard Dawkins and The God Delusion in the [press] biography and felt like I needed to read some more about topics on human nature, religion and philosophy in general.

González is known to most for his rendition of Heartbeats, a hauntingly beautiful cover of Swedish band The Knife's garish 02 electro-pop single. His version of the song adorned the 'bouncing balls' Sony Bravia television advert in 06, which, in turn, propelled his quiet and understated debut album into an international platinum seller. Few realise that due to staggered international album release dates,Veneer is now five years old. Fewer still are aware that at the time it was recorded, González was working through a PhD in Molecular Biology.

"I guess maths and natural sciences were the topics that were most interesting when I was at school," he explains. "So when I chose molecular biology for university I was interested in the fact that you can explain biological phenomenon at the level of molecules and how they interact. I still find it fascinating. As things I could have done for a living at the time, research was my number one choice.

"During the spring in 03, I was getting together the songs for Veneer and doing one show here, one show there, some interviews. Slowly I was doing more and more with the music, so I was trying to do both at the same time. Eventually, I got half a year off from the research project just to try out the music. After that half a year it became clear that I didn't need to, or want to, go back. The record had gone gold, and I was getting more and more shows, so it wasn't really a difficult decision."

González was born 1978 in Gothenburg, Sweden, to Argentinean parents who had fled President Jorge Rafael Videla's occupation of the South American country two years previously. Known as the 'Guerra Sucia' (Dirty War), the military junta who controlled Argentina at the time were responsible for the 'disappearance' of at least 20,000 civilians right up to 1983. As his father was involved in politics, the Swedish embassy was able to provide the family with a way out of the unrest gripping the country. Then, raised in a prominent immigrant suburb of Gothenburg, young José never felt overly out of place as a boy from a Spanish-speaking background living in the centre of Scandinavia.

"There were a lot of Latinos there," he recalls. "People from all over the world, actually. I spoke Spanish at home and when I started school I think half of the class were Swedish and the rest were from different countries. I didn't really think about the fact that I had parents from Argentina.

"My parents weren't into preserving culture that much.They wanted to speak Spanish with us, not Swedish or English, and my dad still drinks maté, an Argentinean tea. But with the music, we weren't really a musical family. My dad used to sing when he was a teenager and my mother is practically non-musical, but there was a guitar at home and I just started playing. Even though there wasn't much, there was some Argentinean folklore and some Brazilian music, especially Silvio Rodriguez who was

my big inspiration at the time, to start writing my own songs.

"I think in general, I haven't really reflected that much on Sweden [as an influence], but around the age of 14 when we started to make music and were into skateboarding, it was really easy to have a rehearsal studio where we could hang out and play music. Being in Gothenburg too, I guess...more

words: Rory Dollard